Scandal File

THE loud complaints from the Clintonites about the tactics of Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr would be more credible if they had ever worried about abusive federal prosecutors before they found themselves on the wrong end of a subpoena. Instead, for every item in the Administration’s long indictment of Starr there is a counterpart in its own policies or in the practices of its own Justice Department.

Consider the broadest complaint of all: Ken Starr is unethical. Specifically, they claim that he violated the American Bar Association’s Model Rule 4.2, which has been adopted as law in all fifty states and the District of Columbia and affirmed in several federal court rulings. Under this rule, if a person is represented by a lawyer, other lawyers wishing to talk to the person must contact the lawyer, not the person himself.

About the Author

Dave Kopel

David B. Kopel is the research director of the Independence Institute and an adjunct law professor at the University of Denver.

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Department of Justice

THE loud complaints from the Clintonites about the tactics of Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr would be more credible if they had ever worried about abusive federal prosecutors before they found themselves on the wrong end of a subpoena. Instead, for every item in the Administration’s long indictment of Starr there is a counterpart in its own policies or in the practices of its own Justice Department.

Consider the broadest complaint of all: Ken Starr is unethical. Specifically, they claim that he violated the American Bar Association’s Model Rule 4.2, which has been adopted as law in all fifty states and the District of Columbia and affirmed in several federal court rulings. Under this rule, if a person is represented by a lawyer, other lawyers wishing to talk to the person must contact the lawyer, not the person himself.